The Bad Boy's Princess

Ch. 21 - The Last Now...

I could still see her, sitting there reading books no 5 year-old girl ever read. Or the ones I knew anyway. Actually, none of the girls I knew even read. Yet there she was, sitting there like a princess in her veranda and reading books instead of playing with the other kids. No matter what I said, she didn't even look at me. She was so beautiful that she became the first girl who made Jace Vanderbilt nervous and flustered.

Grace Lodge, princess of Harvey and Victoria Lodge, heiress of Lodge Holdings. My fiance, or so our parents said. The girl I wanted for so long, and wished to see again. The girl I promised myself to give up on, after I realized I was falling for Avery West.

She was here, standing in my messy closet. With tears in her eyes, holding the only things I had of her.

"Grace..." Even though her name escaped my mouth, spoken into reality, I was still in disbelief that this was real. It couldn't be. She was Avery, not Grace. Was I seeing things... Maybe I was imagining it.

But then I saw tears in her eyes, and I knew that I wasn't dreaming.

Grace was Avery. Avery was Grace. My Avery. My Grace...

Mine.

"Ave, we don't have to talk about it. I'm just glad I found you."

"No..." I was holding her in my arms, terrified that if I let go, this would somehow disappear and I'd wake up from a beautiful dream that was too good to be true. "I... I want to talk about it... I felt horrible holding all these secrets from you and you've been so honest with me... I... I-"

I tightened my arms around her, and she leaned herself into my arms more as if holding me were the only support she had from falling back into her demons. "Shhh, it's alright my sweet girl, I'm right here. I will never let you go, don't cry. It's okay. You're okay."

After a few moments, Avery pulled herself away and faced me. She glided her finger on the initials stitched on the handkerchief that I often used as comfort, and started talking. "The AGL stands for Avery Grace Lodge. But almost everyone in my life called me Grace because my mom said Grace fit my personality more than Avery did."

She smiled, but it was the saddest smile I have ever seen and it cracked my heart. I couldn't possibly imagine how much she must missed her mom. Victoria Lodge was a kind and beautiful woman, Avery looked a lot like her now that I thought about it. I should have fucking realized it sooner, but I didn't want to believe it. It was too unbelievable.

"After my dad got arrested, I was... um..." she started to cry again and I could tell whatever happened, was the reason my sweet innocent Grace turned into the timid and closed-off Avery whom I met again. I held her hand, letting her know I was there for her and would never let anyone hurt her again. She smiled and continued, "I was kidnapped by one of the people he worked with, to blackmail him into keeping quiet about their involvement.... They took me from home and kept me in the basement for nearly ten days..."

"Did they...." I didn't want to know but I had to. I didn't think I could handle the pain of knowing what they did to her. But it was whatever happened that killed the Grace I knew. "Did they hurt you..."

"They would beat me when I started crying and told them I was hungry. Then they started beating me just for the hell of it. One day, I was so scared and hungry that I tried to escape when one of them was asleep and the rest went out. I was so close..." Tears wouldn't stop rolling down her cheeks. "I-I... I was so close... but he woke up and caught me. He had beaten me up so bad that I couldn't see out of my eyes. All I saw and felt was my own blood... And then he... he-"

She didn't have to say it for me to know the bastard abused her sexually. She was only a fucking child... I felt my hands squeezing themselves so hard that my knuckles turned white. I wanted to kill them and torture them for everything they did to her. My blood boiled. My grace... all I could do now was hold her so tight, terrified that she would get hurt again.